Cliché
by VickyVicarious
Summary: Magenta despises clichés. But her life kind of is one, and it really isn’t all that bad. Magenta/Warren


Magenta, contrary to popular opinion, despises being cliché.

She's perfectly aware that she is a bit of one anyway, due to her choice in dress and sarcastic attitude, but she enjoys it and that's who she is. And she's not actually really cliché – she likes certain things, like movies and music, that are _not_ what you would expect. If you were judging her on looks alone, anyway. Which is how most people judge, especially in high school, so maybe that was a valid statement.

She gets average grades, and she's averagely social. She's not overly angsty, but that doesn't mean that she's totally free from any and all stress, like Layla often seems to be. When you get right down to it, Magenta is just like any other person, except that she like to wear lots of black and purple. And if she doesn't actually work to discontinue perceptions people might have of her because of that, it's more because she's too lazy than anything else.

Zach's a great kid, no doubt about it. He's annoying as all get out, but he really does mean well and his idiocy is of the endearing sort. She's aware that as they got to know each other, he had developed a huge crush on her, but somehow it was never really awkward. He was already so awkward on his own that any additional weirdness went unnoticed.

Even better, though, was that it honestly didn't affect their relationship. She went to the dance with them their first year, they had fun, and after it ended she explained to him that she liked him as a friend and nothing more. Zach flushed a little bit, and there was a minimal amount of stuttering, but he bounced back quickly. Within five minutes he was back to normal: loud, obnoxious, and thoroughly enjoying himself.

If it really bothered him, he didn't show it – then or ever. And Magenta doesn't think that it actually did – Zach tends to just accept things with very little fuss, and once she made it clear how she felt, he was cool with that. Their friendship didn't suffer, and even if he still sort of liked her for a while (and possibly still does today) it was never a factor.

Will and Layla have done well. They got off to a bit of a rocky start once the honeymoon phase wore off – the transition from friends to a couple was tough – but they're doing fine now. In fact, they are almost sickeningly sweet at times. Scratch that – they _are_ sickeningly sweet at times.

Ethan is (and always will be) simply _Ethan_. He's exactly the same boy that Magenta has known since first grade, when he corrected the teacher's spelling on the first day of class. It's sort of reassuring actually, that he hasn't changed.

And yes, all of Magenta's friends are sort of clichés in their own right: Will is the hero, quite apart from being a Hero. He's Mr. All-American, the straightlaced, the decent, the trustworthy vanilla boy. Layla is the hippie: she's vegetarian (actually, it's been vegan since last year), and the sort that only wears poly-synthesized whatevers and puts posters up all over school. Even though she got bumped up to Hero after the whole Homecoming fiasco, she still actively protests the whole dichotomy, as well as a dozen other things, and she's the most positive, sweet girl you will ever meet.

Ethan is and always will be the dork. He has a gigantic IQ and a steady 4.0 and he tutors in his time off. He always sits at the front of class and raises his hand often and the only reason he isn't writing papers for seven other people besides himself is because he has powerful friends. Zach is the class clown: he's goofy, loud, bright and obnoxious. He's never really as funny as he thinks but still funny enough, and he's nice enough that everyone likes him okay. Even so, it is only due to his status as Friend of Will Stronghold that he isn't stuffed into lockers daily.

They are all complete clichés actually, which is why it's extraordinary that Magenta loves each and every one of them.

Finally, there is Warren Peace.

Warren is interesting in several ways, because he's both the biggest cliché on _earth_ and at the same time sort of the least clichéd of the bunch.

He wears dark all the time. He broods in the corner and walks around with a scowl on his face. He has a hot temper, especially if you mention his dad. He has a scarred past and everyone's prejudiced against him, and he knows it just as well as the rest of the school. He is powerful; reputed to be the scariest, if not the strongest, student currently in attendance.

And it's not just that; his 'hidden depths' are cliché too, just plucked out of an overdramatic romance novel. His 'dark past' has hurt him, certainly, but despite his tough exterior he's actually sort of a gentleman and a pretty decent guy. He's not all that rich and works at the Paper Lantern; a whole Cinderella element there. He does what's right in the end, then scoffs at the person thanking him – and everyone knows there's nothing sexier than a guy who doesn't know you're alive. Speaking of which: he's distant from everyone. But he is also very attractive, and reputed to be one of, if not the hottest boys in school (literally as well). He's smart too, if his grades and the way he sits around reading really old literature all the time is any indication.

It's rather astonishing that no brave leather-wearing transfer has snapped him up.

When Magenta thinks about him in those terms, she almost wants to shun him just for being so disgustingly _cliché_, no matter how little it is his fault. But then there are other things, little things – the main example of which would have to be his attitude. Warren is completely aware that he is a cliché, just like Magenta. He just doesn't care.

She knows. She asked him.

"Yeah, I know," Warren had said, "But who cares? I do things the way I want and they can feel free to diss me or admire me all they want. If they have nothing better to do than talk about _me_ then they're the worse off."

He raises a fair point. It's almost like he's rejecting the cliché – by adopting it. Sort of.

In any case, he does other stuff too. His interests are not all gothic and dark, just like Magenta. It's a little-known fact that Warren loves cotton-candy, for instance, or that amidst all his thousand-page Russian novels he has the full set of Harry Potter books lined up on a shelf in his bedroom. A bedroom which is decorated perfectly normally and is not painted black or red. In fact, the only truly miraculous thing about Warren's bedroom is that it and almost everything in it is entirely fireproof ("just in case he ever has an _accident_" his mom whispers in the way most parents would speak of their child wetting the bed).

Warren is stoic and mysterious to even those who know him best, always surprising and a pretty tough gentleman. He's a complete cliché, but he's always _himself_ so shamelessly that Magenta couldn't help but fall for him eventually.

It's no big dramatic romance, and any deep emotional scars remain buried at least for now. But they got closer together and one day Magenta asked Warren if she could make sure of something.

He agreed and she kissed him, and sure enough it was _great_. So then he was a bit surprised but not overly (along with not caring, Warren is pretty unflappable even about the most personal of non-father-related things) and he said sure, why not try it out?

Between the two of them, the first date was easy-going and so was the second that followed and on and on. And when Magenta had her little commitment freak-out, Warren had no qualms about telling everyone that she was just being stupid, they _were_ in fact dating. But he didn't smother her any to make his point, which just made her like him all the more.

They don't have some big _connection_ or anything. But they like each other well enough and get along okay. It's a pretty nice, healthy relationship overall and Magenta is happy. Even if sometimes she wishes that she had chosen to date Zach because everyone just _had_ to pair her and Warren together automatically. Just because she's a bit goth and he's a bit the same doesn't mean they will just _have_ to be together.

Except apparently, it does. And Magenta resents that greatly but she likes dating Warren more. Over time, she's come to accept his philosophy for the most part: do what you want and let them think what they will.

Magenta despises clichés. But her life kind of is one, and it really isn't all that bad.


End file.
